Friday - Recommendations

It's Friday!

The end of the work week and another original post about what's going on in the world/my life.

I would like to make some recommendations.

The first is about a flashlight from Applied Innovative Technologies. They manufacture an LED (Light Emitting Diode) shake flashlight. These types of flashlights require No batteries and the LED "bulb" useful life is measured in years.

There is a drawback to these types of lights; they don't put out a lot of light when compared to a typical battery-powered flashlight. A shake flashlight also requires a little bit of work every few of minutes to work. You have to shake the flashlight for it to work.

I bought one to test. First, I took the flashlight into a closet and shook the flashlight for about 2 minutes. It provided enough light for me to see. Next, I took the light into our very dark basement and read labels on various cans and boxes. The next test, I let the flashlight drain down (it took a while to go totally dark) then shook the light with the switch on. I immediately got light as I shook the flashlight. My last test, I turned the flashlight off and shook the flashlight for a few minutes and put it on a shelf. I came back a few weeks later and the flashlight turned on instantly.

I was so impressed; I gave a few as Christmas gifts to friends. Yeah, I was that impressed with this company and their product.

Lastly, be careful. There are some inexpensive shake flashlights that have a button battery inside them. These flashlight will go dead (and stay dead) when the button battery dies.

Applied Innovative Technologies
http://www.appliedinnotech.com

My second recommendation is to give emergency preparedness gifts this Christmas. Sorry, I didn't think of this sooner. If not for Christmas, you could give emergency preparedness gifts for birthdays and other occasions.

My third and last recommendation is for a blog. The blog is Charles Hugh Smith's "Of Two Minds" blog. He deals with current and future trends. I suggest you read him for a few days and make sure you check out his previous writings at the bottom of the page. (on his site)

Of Two Minds by Charles Hugh Smith
http://www.oftwominds.com/blog.html

My final thought, for tonight. Make sure you are stocking up on food and water. I don't know what is going to happen, but I do know that you and your family will need to eat and drink no matter what happens in the next few weeks.

Friday - Guns

It's Friday!

The end of the work week and another original post about what's going on in the world/my life.

Guns are Awesome!!! They are even used in both the Summer and Winter Olympics.

Just remember, don't confuse the shooting sports with getting prepared for an emergency. Some of the techniques and equipment are transferable but not all are needed by you and me.

This leads me to another thought, about confusion.

Some people on the internet are advocating buying pistol/rifle magazines, ammunition, handguns, and rifles for investment purposes. Their thoughts are that B. Hussein Obama will prohibit/ban ammunition and guns.

It is possible. Very Possible. But!

Will he, and it is just not him. Congress has to get involved for some of the more serious damage to be done to our rights as citizens.

Will Congress? I don't know.

So let us look at some ways that B. Hussein Obama could do this, by himself.

*Have the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (formerly known as the ATF, now the ATFE) prevent ammunition from being imported into these United States of America.

*Have the ATFE implement "New" regulations further closing gun stores.

*Instruct the Attorney General to tightly define "Sporting Purposes" for ammunition and firearms

*He could ban the importation of certain firearms and their parts like Bush's and Clinton's executive orders

With Congress's help, he could:

*Raise taxes on firearm and ammunition purchases

*Institute "one gun a month" programs

*Prohibit the sale and manufacturing of new magazines and certain types of firearms to "civilians"

Blah, blah, blah. Scary stuff.

Could happen. But remember, you are getting ready for an emergency. Do you need a $1,200 rifle that uses $50 magazines to be prepared for an emergency?

As an investment?

And if you are buying guns, ammo, and magazines as an investment, that means you have purchased all of the stuff you need to survived the emergencies you identified during your threat analysis.

Have you bought enough food, water, clothing, shelter, money in an emergency fund, supplies for heating, blankets, and ex cetera. Yes, this includes guns and ammo for each member of your family that you plan to arm for an emergency. Did you?

If you didn't, you shouldn't be investing in guns, gold, silver, or other stuff.

OK. my last thought for this Friday.

There are people starting to talk about shooting government officials. Wow! That is serious talk.

I have a few questions before they proceed with their plans.

Have they tried writing letters to the editors? How about letters to their elected representatives? Stood on a soap box shouting about the injustices of our country in the town square?

How about voting? Giving money or even better "time" to a candidate? Running for office?

The above is known as "First the soap box, second the ballot box, and lastly, the bullet box."

I don't think it's time for the bullet box.

But what happens, if no one listens to me. We could have the start of a shooting war. If you think this could happen, you might want to do research about what happened in Yugoslavia in the '90 and make plans from there.

Once again, I would like to give thanks to SayUncle for all of his posts these many months. (Months for me; Years for him)

I wonder if that's a monkey thing.

Friday - Food

It's Friday!

The end of the work week and another original post about what's going on in the world/my life.

Recently, I was checking out another person's blog called "Everyday Prepper" at http://everydayprepper.wordpress.com/ and an article titled "32 Pounds of Rice Later." Lilthump was putting up some rice using a method I have never used. The method uses dry ice.

She/he has a good rundown of this method. I think, he/she also has some great advice in the last paragraph of the post.

Additionally, Lilthump ran into a situation with her/his buckets and other canning supplies delivered to the wrong address. I think you should have a stock answer if this situation happens to you because your neighbor might ask what this stuff is for.

I have also been occassionally reading another blog titled "Stealth Survival" at http://www.stealthsurvival.blogspot.com/ Riverwalker has an informative site pack fill of information.

He has a few posts on a wide range of food preparation subjects. Below are a few of his posts. Check him out and read his archives.

Links:

Everyday Prepper - 32 Pounds of Rice Later
http://everydayprepper.wordpress.com/2008/11/09/32-pounds-of-rice-later

Stealth Survival - Powdered Milk
http://stealthsurvival.blogspot.com/2008/11/simple-food-storage-items-powdered-milk.html

Stealth Survival - Preventing Corrosion on Canned Goods
http://stealthsurvival.blogspot.com/2008/11/food-storage-tips-preventing-corrosion.html

Another Method of Food Storage
http://stealthsurvival.blogspot.com/2008/11/simple-survival-tips-alternate-food.html

Stealth Survival - Proper Food Storage Conditions
http://stealthsurvival.blogspot.com/2008/11/proper-food-storage-conditions-moisture.html

Stealth Survival - Food Peelers
http://stealthsurvival.blogspot.com/2008/11/simple-survival-tools-peelers.html